RT Queens Worksheet

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1. Describe the stasis in the play: where, when, who, what, etc. in a paragraph.
  • Brenda Aoki is a young teenager who's a mix of Scot, Islander, Chinese, Mexican, and Japanese living on the Westside in California during the 1960's with her family and working in her father's drugstore. Brenda is her father's best worker and assists him in answering phone calls, working around a passed out Big Mike, and chatting with Aunt Mary when she comes to exchange her roses for prescriptions.

2. What is the intrusion?
  • There are multiple intrusions since this is most of Brenda's life story and expands to many years. What interrupts Brenda from her usual daily mundane routine is Kali. While attending the regatta, Aunt Mary introduces Brenda to her son Darren. After their meeting, Brenda begins to do the out of the ordinary and puts on tight bathing suits and attempting to surf six foot waves. He gave her her first kiss and it was the beginning of Brenda growing up. The second intrusion occurs when Brenda must move back home to help support her family. By dropping out of college and deciding to become a teacher, she gets caught up in drama with her students and a rekindling with Kali. Years later, the most significant intrusion occurs when Kali is arrested and kept in jail for two years. This destruction of his self worth will lead to his outrageous drunken behavior and the shootout with Smoke's gang.

3. What is the unique factor?
  • Kali's fight with Steven
  • Kali and Brenda's meetup years later
  • Rosie coming to Brenda to breakdown

4. What is the dramatic question that should be answered by the end of the play?
  • Will Brenda and Kali end up together?
  • Will the drama be settled between Kali and Smoke?

5. Provide an illustration of the two kinds of exposition that the play has in it.
  • Information known to most: Aunt Mary's roses are the only beautiful thing growing in the Westside which is why her garden is referred to as the Queen's garden and the significance of her roses dying in the end but a few growing back a few times out of the years is representative of Brenda leaving the Westside behind but always having a little bit of it live in her.
  • Information known to one: Hai had to leave her family behind when she came to America, making the audience appreciate her more as a character and Brenda starts to consider her family.

6. Identify the most theatrical moment in the play and of what importance it seems to be.
  • The shoot out at the end of the play is the most theatrical moment in the play because it reveals how loyal Kali and Smoke really were to each other. After Kali's downward spiral, he turns Smoke in to authorities and it's the first act of significant violence in the play. Audiences even see Sherry's fourteen-year old get caught up in his father's gang activity. Characters' lives are threatened and relationships come to an end.

7. List some of the themes of the play.
  • Family
  • Love
  • Loyalty
  • Responsibility

8. What do the narrator want and what are some obstacles that stand in the way of her getting what she wants?
  • Brenda wants to be successful and go to college so she doesn't end up pregnant, alone and in a mumu like what's expected of her. Brenda makes it to college, but remains loyal to her family and moves back home when they face financial difficulties. After finally settling into her new life as a teacher on the Westside, Kali comes back into her life, discouraging her job as a teacher and makes Brenda his own personal babysitter, preventing her from excelling at her career and from loving him the way she used to.

9. Describe some possible images in the play and how does the title help us understand the play.
  • Roses: emphasize the smog industrialized Westside because they're the only beautiful vegetation in the area
  • Hai's teacups: The last bit of Brenda's friend to remember her by and Kali drops and breaks it, leaving Brenda with nothing to remind her of Hai

10. Briefly define the family relationships that are examined in the play.
  • Brenda's family prefers her to be more traditional, living with them and working for them to keep the business within the family. When Brenda begins to assimilate to other cultures, her father becomes furious and disowns her, but Brenda is happy to take on a new life. Audiences don't know if the family ever reunites and resolves their problem, but we hope they'd be proud of their daughter's success as a play write.